


What Do You Want From Me, Common Sense?

by Solena2



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Also i don't have the patience to let someone review my works before posting, Gen, Humor, Isekai Elements, No Romance, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Self-Insert, Warnings May Change, catch me worldbuilding while cackling evilly, flowey is definitely going to reappear, no beta we die like men, rated teen for my potty mouth, the writing goes straight from my gremlin hands to your waiting eyeballs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:48:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27954920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solena2/pseuds/Solena2
Summary: I fall into the underground and promptly go off script.
Comments: 15
Kudos: 28





	1. Curiosity Killed the Cat (and I'm not Satisfied)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A portal appears in my bedroom and I immediately walk in, because that's just the kind of person I am.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a purely self indulgent fic, and as such it has no update schedule or plot outline. MC is also going to end up super overpowered if I get that far, so don't go into this expecting me to obey the "rules of writing" or whatever. That's for my other fics, thanks.

I am sitting in my room, not doing much of anything, (as per usual) when I look up and notice that my mirror has apparently transformed into a solid wall of inky darkness as I’ve been spacing out.

And well- it’s not like I can _not_ poke it, right? There’s a high chance I’ll seriously regret it, if my life has become the isekai it appears to be, but there’s a 100% chance I’ll regret it forever if I _don’t_ touch it, you know?

Everyone always assumes I’m risk averse, that I like to play it safe, but the truth of the matter is I’ve just never found something I really want to take a risk with.

So, I push myself out of bed with a hand and go grab my shoes, because there’s no way in hell I’m touching something that might be a portal with no shoes on. Thankfully, I’m actually dressed for once, rather than being in my bathrobe like usual. 

Once I’ve got my shoes on, I grab my coat from where it hangs by my dresser and walk straight into what used to be my mirror. I hope my parents aren’t too worried by my disappearance. Maybe I’ll be lucky and this will be the kind of isekai that retroactively erases me from existence? That would be kind of nice, to exist without tethers.

The portal (because that’s what it is, I’m pretty sure) feels cool, but not unpleasantly so. Like when you first put on a fleece sweater and it takes a moment to warm up.

If this were a stereotypical isekai story, things would quickly become very unpleasant in this dark void, and some godlike being would reach out to grant me power beyond my wildest imaginings.

I’ve never been one to cave to expectations, though. Not even my own.

The darkness remains cool and comforting, and I continue walking forward because there’s no chance I’m going to turn back now, with so much possibility awaiting me if I only continue long enough.

Eventually, I feel as if I’ve passed some threshold, and something definably changes within me. Can’t say what, though. I’ve always kinda sucked at interpreting what my body is trying to tell me, so I’ll probably have to figure it out on my own.

At some point the darkness and walking grows boring, and so I do what I often do when bored, and curl up to go to sleep. This place isn’t cold enough for me to need a blanket, and I’ve got my coat with me anyway, so I’m fine. Sleeping on hard surfaces isn’t unpleasant, in my opinion, merely a bit annoying, since if you pick the wrong position you’ll inevitably wake up sore.

As always, consciousness takes a while to fade, so I occupy myself with grand imaginings about all the wonderful (and terrible, I’ve got anxiety okay, I can’t help it) things that might await me.

==

When I wake, it’s immediately obvious that something is different. There’s light now, for one, and for two I can feel something soft and organic beneath me. Judging by smell alone… Flowers? Waking up on a bed of flowers in a lit room… Well, I’ve always wished I could live in Undertale, if only so I could chew out the characters for bottling up their feelings so damn much. Hey, maybe if I’m lucky, that one headcanon I have about Sans secretly being a teenager will be right and I’ll be able to flirt with him without it being creepy.

Oh come on, like everyone attracted to dudes and not overly hung up about species concerns doesn’t want to kiss that guy, are you kidding me? Plus, I love puns and I’m depressed, surely we’ll get along.

Oh boy, I’m definitely going to die, huh? Thank fuck for my high pain tolerance and ridiculous resistance to trauma, am I right?

Finally, I open my eyes, because I like to wake up slow and I see no reason to alter my existing routine simply because I’ve apparently been yeeted into my favorite video game. Hey, speaking of favorite video games, will I get to visit Hollow Knight next? No, wait, that would probably suck, wouldn’t it. Ah, well.

The cave is just as beautiful as I always imagined it would be. Though it looked lovely in the game art, there’s truly nothing that can compare to seeing the sight in person, those marble pillars in a half circle around me, that single spot of sunlight in the ceiling far (far, far) above. Not to mention the lovely flowers I’m laying on at this very moment and- there’s a dead body under me, isn’t there. Is Chara going to show up, or am I left to be alone in my head?

Though their narration doesn’t actually start until you meet Flowey, in the game, so I suppose I’ll just have to wait and see.

Wait.

Wait wait wait.

Which human soul am I taking the place of right now? Because I read a fic once where the protagonist wasn’t the seventh, even if it was a fakeout, and I very much do not want to be saddled with the fate of _those_ poor bastards.

Though, maybe I’d be able to talk my way out? There’s no one who’d call me diplomatic, for sure, but I’m pretty great at knowing exactly where to aim an insult to utterly break someone’s spirit. (Unusual skill, I’m aware, but in my defense I was bullied growing up)(I say “growing up” like I’m not still doing it, like I’m not fourteen and trapped in a world where it’s an accepted fact that the protagonist will die, and several times over, too)

My first order of business is Flowey, before I can take the time to freak out, to hold myself tight and weather the sheer panic that Toto, I am not in Kansas anymore.

I get up. I give a last fond look to the beautiful cave I’ve “fallen” into, and I walk to the next room, hoping all the while that I’m not signing my own death sentence.

Once I’m a few feet in, there he is, in all his fucking glory.

Flowey the flower, the soulless remnant of prince Asriel Dreemurr, former hope of the underground, possibly still holder of the ability to control time itself.

Yeah, I’m definitely going to mess with him. Self preservation is for losers.

“You’re a flower with a face,” I say before he can start with his usual greeting. I have it memorized anyway, so it’s not like I’m missing out on anything.

He makes his T-T face, so I know this isn’t how he thought this would go. 

“Wow, human! What gave you that impression?” Ooh, sassy. Literally his only positive trait.

“Well I have eyes, see,” I was planning to ask him probing questions, but honestly this is just as good. His expression doesn’t change as he says his next sentence, nor does his ever cheery tone, (and holy fuck his voice is just as vaguely creepy as I’d imagined, all that childlike innocence paired with the fact that he’s a mass murderer)

“Well howdy, human with eyes! I’m Flowey, flowey the flower!” He says. I don’t interject.

“You’re clearly new to the underground, and it looks like I’m the only one around to show you how things work around here! Are you ready?” 

…

“I’m really not, to be honest. I’ve got no idea what’s going on,” So my plan here, basically, is to stall until Toriel gets here. Mostly because I’m hoping that if he doesn’t get the chance to do his betrayal, he’ll keep pretending to be nice, which will be hilarious since I’ll know he’s faking the whole time.

Admittedly, this significantly increases the likelihood that Toriel won’t come to save me when he inevitably finds a secluded place to murder me, but if I think too hard about the long term right now I’m going to scream, so.

“Well you see, human, you’ve fallen into the underground, a land inhabited by monsters! Don’t worry though, we’re quite nice,” Oh right, conversation. I wonder how much info I can get out of him…

“What’s a monster? Like, I know what it means on the surface, but that definition is pretty vague, and I don’t want to be accidentally racist,” 

His face pops back to the usual smile. (Side note: his face looks like it was drawn on with sharpie and it’s totally messing me up)

“A monster is a being made of magic!” Ok, that’s… a bit vague, but not really inaccurate. I guess he doesn’t want to get into the science, which is a damn shame, since he probably knows it backwards and forwards due to all his reset shenanigans.

“Woah, cool. Magic is real? How does it work without breaking thermodynamics?” Finally, the question I’ve always wanted to ask. If energy can’t be created, how the fuck does Toriel shoot fireballs from her hands? What is she drawing on, what is the fire burning, how hot is it, how does it keep being on fire, etc. etc. repeat for every magical display in the game.

“Well, a lot of it isn’t super understood. Scientists have mostly been pinning it on ‘dark energy’ like they do with every other phenomenon they don’t totally understand,” I wonder why he’s so willingly entertaining my time wasting antics. I know, in game, he didn’t realize he’d lost control over the timeline until after his first talk with Frisk, so maybe he’s just waiting it out to see where it goes? And then of course he must be planning other things to do with me before he takes my soul and goes to the surface…

“God, I hate dark energy in science. I know they just call it that because not much is known about it, but I’m thirsty for knowledge, you know?” Actually ‘thirsty for knowledge’ describes my mood like 90% of the time. Huh, actually, I have that in common with Flowey, right? Even if his knowledge thirst is just due to boredom.

“Hey, human, me too! Learning new things is great!” There’s a loaded sentence if i’ve ever heard one. When was the last time he learned something new? He’s supposedly read every book in the underground, but how much information from that did he actually retain?

“Isn’t it? It’s why I love Youtube so much. Free information for anyone who cares to make a few clicks!” Wait, he probably doesn’t know what Youtube is, actually.

“What’s Youtube?” He asks, cocking his head.

“It’s a service where you can upload videos or watch videos other people have uploaded,” Not the most nuanced explanation, but it’ll do for now. Before Flowey has a chance to respond, a fireball manifests next to him. 

I don’t smile because I’m pretending to be shocked, but I’m laughing my ass off on the inside. The face he makes is even more ridiculous in person.

Enter Toriel, queen of the monsters, mother of no living children.


	2. So THAT'S How They Make Clothes!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Me and Toriel chat, and I get a chance to grill her about the textile industry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tonal consistency? Never heard of it.

“Why’d you shoot fire at him?” I ask, partially to fuck with her and partially out of genuine curiosity. He hadn’t been attacking me, after all, so it was odd that she’d intervene. What did he do to get her to set him on fire just for being _near_ a human?

Toriel purses her lips, and I note that her hands are clenched tightly. Must’ve been bad, then.

“He hides a wicked nature behind a congenial facade. Please, my child, keep your trust out of his reach,”

Oh, she’s just as formal in person! That’s honestly kinda cool. I’m pretty sure I’m the only one I know who’s ever used ‘congenial’ in a sentence, but for her it just seems natural.

“I definitely have more questions about that, but first, can you not call me your child, please? We literally _just_ met,” Seriously, it’s weird. I know she’s grieving, but spontaneously adopting every child that falls without their approval or consent is kinda messed up. 

If I manage to free the monsters, the first thing I’m doing on the surface is sticking them all in therapy. Seriously, these guys are worse than _me_ , and I _really_ don’t say that lightly.

Toriel’s face falls slightly, though she makes a valiant effort to hide it. (Seriously, _what were you expecting me to say_?)

“A-Ah, I suppose that _is_ reasonable. May I ask your name, then?” Ok, people who are definitely reading this because I am 100% egotistical enough to assume y’all want to hear about my life. Listen up, because I’m going to say this as many times as the author wants me to. I know this is normally the part where I’d say ‘y/n’ but I want to make it clear that y/n is for _reader_ inserts.

 _I_ am a _self_ insert, which I know because no reader insert would ever have this much personality, those boring fucks. As a self insert, I am free to call myself Ebony Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way and dye my hair black with purple streaks if I so desire.

(I don’t, I really don’t, My Immortal is a fun read if you want something to laugh at but no way in hell am I emulating that MC in any respect other than our shared enjoyment of MCR.)

ANYWAY, back to my conversation with goat mom! I’m not saying my real name because I’ve resolved that if I ever end up getting isekai’d I’ll go by my middle name, due to its general awesomeness. (My first name is also awesome, but it has a different vibe and aesthetics are _everything_ in fantasy worlds)

“My name is Solena,” I say, responding after a reasonable pause in actual time and a weirdly long one in mental time. Now, my name looks like it would be pronounced ‘sol-een-a’ but it’s actually ‘sol-ain-uh’ which I’m stating because again, I’m fully confident that these thoughts are being written down somewhere by some enterprising author who is also very likely me from another timeline because no one else in existence is fully capable of conveying the Wonder that is Me.

“Thank you for telling me, Solena. My name is Toriel, and I will be your caretaker while you are in these ruins,” Toriel says, conveniently leaving out the fact that she’d prefer to keep me in these ruins forever, probably because I’ve already demonstrated some leeriness towards her.

Now, I _could_ bring up Flowey again here, seeing as her explanation for fireballing him was more than a little lackluster and I’m still pretending not to know this world inside and out, but I already know stuff about Flowey and there are things I’m significantly more curious about.

“Cool! Toriel, got it. Hey, if you live in a cave underground, how did you get such a nice dress? Do you have farms down here? Livestock? Do you harvest fibers from animal monsters?” 

Haha, you thought I’d ask more about the magic? Hell no! I’m way more curious about how society functions down here!

Toriel does a double take, her expression implying that she’s revising all of her expectations towards me. (Again)

“There are small plant farms in some areas of the underground. We have no livestock down here, as we were delivered to this cave system in a bit of a rush, but we do harvest some fibers from willing monsters, yes. How did you guess it?”

Let me tell you, the high I’m getting right now from those theories being correct? Very similar to what happened recently in the BNHA comic with Dabi’s true identity. I am _living_ for this, just absolutely vibing with this new knowledge.

“Well, I don’t see how else you’d do it. How do you get the dyes?” Because I don’t see them having access to chemical dye, and it’s not like humans trash a lot of the stuff unless this is one of _those_ illegal dumping spots, so what gives?

“Excellent question, Solena! There are professional tailors who transfer dye from clothes that fall from the surface! Many also simply wear clothes acquired from the trash, though mine are hand-crafted as befits-” She cuts herself off before she can let slip her (former?) royal status. I let it slide because I really don’t see a need to step on trauma landmines here.

“As befits someone who’s! Affluent! Anyway, we’ve entered the Ruins proper! There are many dangerous puzzles here, an old monster tradition, so I’ll need to focus more on guiding you!” Damn it, we’re at the first puzzle already? I completely missed the staircase room, which sucks because not only did I miss out on seeing one of my favorite rooms, I didn’t notice whether there was a save point!

Fuck!

I walk to the sign by the door. “Brave ones, foolish ones, both walk not the middle road. What’s that mean? I obviously get it in the proverbial sense, but it’s near this puzzle, so is it supposed to be a clue?” 

It straight up took me until my second playthrough to understand that sign, man. 

Toriel’s face just _lights up_. She looks absolutely delighted, and I remember that she’s always wanted to be a teacher.

“It is a misdirection! The sign tricks the reader into thinking about it metaphorically, when the answer is actually quite literal!” She demonstrates by stepping on all the buttons but the center two, before turning to smile at me.

“Oh, that’s genius! Because you’re supposed to ignore the tiles in the middle! It works as a puzzle while also having an easily remembered solution if you’re in a hurry!” It’s honestly my favorite puzzle in the game for that, even if you’re never given the opportunity to solve it yourself.

“That is exactly what I was thinking when I created it! It is wonderful to hear that the message came across to someone, even if my- my, ah, my _friends_ had consistent difficulty with it!”

We continue chatting about puzzles as we walk into the next room.

Toriel explains the spike puzzle here and how you’re supposed to memorize the layout of the first room to safely traverse the spikes. She also explains that she locked the ‘incorrect’ spikes permanently in the ‘up’ position so that no one would get hurt, stating that puzzles should be fun, not dangerous.

Honestly, she’s giving way more exposition than she ever did in the game, probably because I’m a slut for knowledge. I only really half hear her explanation, though, because what comes next is going to be very important to knowing the kind of experience I’m going to have down here.

See, we haven’t gone down the hallway to the spike room yet, and I know full well there’s a Froggit waiting there to ambush me.

I have a few questions that this pseudo fight will hopefully answer.

One, are there options like there are in the game? Because if the battle system is the same, it could severely limit my choices when it comes to conflict resolution, especially if I have the same options as Frisk.

Two, do I have a narrator and is that narrator Chara? TwoA, do they have control over me in fights, as in some fics, or am I fully autonomous? TwoB, if they are here, are they evil or are they a person, because that’s also something the fandom intensely and frequently disagrees about. TwoC, can they hear my thoughts? I’m going with ‘probably not’ because I’ve made zero effort to exclude spoilers, but there's still a possibility and I need it confirmed. TwoD, can they hear thoughts deliberately directed at them? I hope so, it would be a huge pain to only be able to talk to them when no one’s around.

Three, are Froggits secretly cats because there’s a meme comic about that and I need it in my life.

With these thoughts in mind, Toriel and I turn down the hall, and the world goes black and white.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Toriel is genuinely an absolute delight to write for.  
> Also, I mentioned it in a comment but I know not everyone reads those so I'm just gonna say: There is never going to be serious romance in this story. I may include some light-hearted flirting with my personal favorites, but no dates of any kind will occur because that's not the kind of story I'm trying to tell.


End file.
